


Shoplifters Beware

by Noellefics



Category: Firebringer - Team StarKid
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-10-13 04:43:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17481410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Noellefics/pseuds/Noellefics
Summary: Zazzalil notices a nervous girl in the surf shop she works at and intervenes. Jemilla is grateful.





	Shoplifters Beware

Outside, the water was providing perfect swells for surfing. Zazzalil, however, was stuck inside while working at the surf shop near the beach. She didn’t mind too much, as the owner of the store pretty much let her have free reign—not to mention a killer employee discount.

After the morning rush, the store had emptied out considerably and Zazz was organizing a section or the store that a group of high school boys had knocked over. The store owner must have been rubbing off on her as she had kicked them out after calling them a bunch of “privileged fucks.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the girl who had just entered the shop. She suspected her to be about the same age, noticing the small emblem of the local university on her jacket. The way the girl looked at the various merchandise told Zazzalil that there was no way this girl was a surfer. However, she was always willing to help a beginner unlike some of the dude-bros who worked at one of the other shops down the street.

Zazzalil had a rule to not immediately crowd new customers, preferring to give them a few minutes to browse before asking if they needed help. She kept working on fixing the display while occasionally glancing up at the girl.

The college girl was standing behind a rack with some of their smaller items like branded keychains and bumper stickers. Hmm, maybe not a beginner at all, Zazz thought. Maybe the girl was just picking up a little gift for a friend. Still, the quick glances the girl was making at Zazzalil gave her pause. The girl wasn’t exactly subtle with her panicked, hasty looks across the store. The thought hit Zazzalil—not a beginner surfer but a beginner shoplifter.

As the girl turned items over to look at price tags, Zazzalil considered her options. Something seemed off about her behavior. Their typical thieves didn’t usually go for the small items nor did they look so scared while doing it.

Zazzalil strode toward the girl, curious as to how this would turn out.  
  
“You do know the store policy on shoplifters, right?” she asked, gesturing to the sign behind the counter.

In scribbled pen, it read “ALL SHOPLIFTERS WILL BE GIVEN A WEDGIE, A SWIRLY, AND THEN TAPED TO THE ELECTRIC POLE.” One of Zazzalil’s inventions, a way to shame the thieves without calling the police on dumb high school or college kids. Molag had laughed the first time she read the sign and the positive social media response led to more foot traffic, so Zazzalil counted it as a win.

Her potential next victim glanced back at the sign, before inhaling deeply.

“I’m so sorry. My friend’s friends are assholes. They said I wasn’t cool enough to hang out with them and that I was a nerdy prude. When I said I wasn’t stuck up, they said I had to prove it by stealing something from the store. They’re holding on to my wallet so I couldn’t just fake it and I was hoping I could get one of these little wax things and write you an IOU, maybe?”  


“Wow, yeah. Those guys are assholes. Lucky for you, I get a pretty awesome employee discount here. Follow me,” Zazz said while grabbing a pair of sunglasses and walking toward the register. She scanned the glasses, a few flair buttons from the bucket on the counter, and keyed in her employee password. For a part-time employee trying to work her way through school, even spending $15 unexpectedly could stress her out but she was always a sucker for a cute girl with a tendency to ramble.

“Ok, put these on your head and the buttons in your pocket. Should look natural enough and make those jerks think you took multiple things and not even the cheapest item here.”

The girl followed her instructions before giving her a half-grin.

“Thank you so much,” the thwarted shoplifter said as she squinted at her savior’s nametag, “Zazzalil. I don’t know what I would have done without you. Probably sneak out the side entrance and go home without having them see me. Can I come back tomorrow to pay you back?”

“Consider it a gift. If you wanted to give me something, though, you could give me your name?”

“Jemilla. Can I at least buy you coffee some time?”

Tomorrow was Zazzalil’s off-day and coffee did sound nice, so she went ahead and shook her head yes. Jemilla was probably just trying to be nice; it probably wasn’t a date at all.   

After making plans to visit the café around the corner tomorrow, Jemilla headed to the door. Zazzalil gave her a thumbs up before returning back to her previous task of picking up the shop.

* * *

Jemilla spotted Zazzalil across the café and waved at her as she got in line. The girl was already sitting down with a mug in front of her, which kind of ruined her plans to do something nice to repay the girl.

Despite the crowd in the little coffee shop, the line moved quickly and it was soon her turn. She ordered a chai latte and then glanced at the bakery display. Looking back at Zazz, she realized she had no idea what the girl would like. Thankfully, the barista saved her from her internal dilemma.

“Zazzy loves anything sweet. Her favorite is that chocolate butterfinger cupcake though. It’s big enough to split too,” the barista said with an impossibly large grin and then actually winked at her.

Jemilla thanked her and ordered one, eying the huge cupcake warily. Depositing her change into the tip jar, she picked up her drink and walked over to the far side of the café where Zazzalil was sitting at a corner table.

“Hey, I got us a cupcake to share—hope you don’t mind!”

When Zazzalil looked up, her eyes widened like a kid in a candy store. “Those are my favorite. How’d you know?”

“The girl with the sloth ‘hang loose’ button on her apron may have tipped me off.”

“Keeri is way too good to me. I’ll have to thank her later.”

Keeri. Zazzalil was on a first name basis with the attractive barista. Perhaps she came there a lot? Or maybe they were just friends outside of work? Jemilla pushed those thoughts away, having already gotten too deep in her head for what was supposed to be just thank you coffee.

“So how did the rest of your day go yesterday? Did you put those assholes in their place?” Zazzalil asked her, pulling her out of her thoughts.

Jemilla laughed, remembering the look on Ducker’s face when the group spotted her.

“Well, even if it was a complete lie, it was fun to prove them wrong. The last thing one of the guys, Ducker, said to me before I had to go into the store was “you don’t have the guts,” which maybe he was somewhat right about, but he doesn’t need to know that.”

“Wait, the guy who always wears a robe around and owns like zero shirts? That Ducker?”

Jemilla nodded and it was Zazzalil’s turn to laugh.

“No wonder he was involved. He was actually one of my first victims of the shoplifting policy,” Zazz said while pulling out her phone, “10k likes on Instagram and counting.”

Jemilla glanced down at the picture and was glad that that jerk had gotten what was coming to him at least once in his life. Even though the rest of the group had warmed up to her yesterday, she still wasn’t sure she wanted to hang out with them again.

“So the sign isn’t just for show?”

“No, the store owner basically lets me do what I want. A lot of times it’s just dumb kids and I don’t really want to call the cops on them, you know? Some days if I’m feeling really lazy I might just make them take out the trash or something though. How did you end up hanging out with Ducker in the first place?”

Jemilla finished her bite of cupcake before answering. The whole thing was a little too sweet for her, but her companion seemed to enjoy it and she would probably have no problem finishing it.  

“I met this girl Schwoopsie at a party on campus over the weekend and she had invited me to hang out with her friends for the day. Everything just escalated from there, I guess.”

Schwoopsie had seemed nice when she met her. They had danced together at the quad mixer and then the girl had walked her back to her dorm and kissed her. It wasn’t that she wasn’t nice yesterday, but Jemilla had expected the girl to at least stand up for her to her friends. When they had talked about it after, Schwoopsie had said she wasn’t looking for a girlfriend and she liked Jemilla but it was just a casual thing.

Jemilla wasn’t necessarily looking for a girlfriend, either, but she would have thought that even a friend would stick up for her. She’d probably still hang out with Schwoopsie, but it did leave a sour taste in her mouth.

Zazzalil seemed to notice her long pause and thankfully changed the subject.

“What are you studying?”

“I’m just finishing my freshman year, but I’m hoping to do philosophy. I’ve taken two classes in it so far and really enjoyed both of them.”

She paused and waited for the judgment of having a “useless major” and for Zazzalil to ask her how she ever expected to get a real job with that. Really, Jemilla dreamed of being a lawyer and philosophy was both an interesting subject and one of the best ways to prepare for the LSAT. A freshman student describing themselves as pre-law was just so cringy, though.

“Oh that’s really cool that you’ve found something you like. I took a philosophy class down at the community college last semester and it literally fried my brain to think about.”

“What program are you doing there?”

“I didn’t really know what I wanted to study so I decided I’d knock out some pre-reqs first while I figured it out. I’m actually transferring over next year to the university as this weird science professor managed to get me a scholarship there.”

“How’d that happen?”

“Your guys’ catering is like unreal. And all of the events are posted online, plus half the time you don’t even have to be a student to register. So whenever I had a day off, I’d register for whatever panel or conference was going on and snag free lunch. Back in the fall, there was this symposium on climate change going on when I had a couple days off in a row. I show up and it’s actually really interesting. The last day I end up talking with one of the faculty organizers about my experience with surfing since he did some research around water levels. He told me that he really hoped I would consider taking his class next semester and then I had to tell him I went to the local community college instead. He insisted that I still show up for his class and my boss worked it into my schedule so I ended up going twice a week this semester.”

“Wow, can’t say I pictured you as the nerdy type!”

“Jemilla!” Zazz said, reaching over to slap her hand lightly, “Anyway, I became his assistant, kind of? He’s an eccentric dude who doesn’t really take care of himself. Gave me money once to buy him groceries. When he was convinced I could understand the material, he worked out some kind of deal where if I did work-study in the science department, I’d get a full ride. I guess he publishes enough research that the university has to do what he wants. It’ll be hard balancing that and my job next year, but I couldn’t turn it down.”

 “That’s so awesome. It sounds like you really worked for it and I’m glad you were rewarded for it! Do you think you’ll do a science major?”

“I don’t know. I liked the science classes I took so far and it would definitely make sense. But there’s so much work! Especially if I did a PhD! I just want to be lazy,” Zazz whined.

They continued talking about themselves, Jemilla moving here for school, Zazzalil being promoted to store manager after working at the surf shop all through high school, jumping from topic to topic with hardly any awkward pause before Jemilla noticed the time. Their drinks and cupcake had been long gone and the sun was starting to set as she glanced around.

“I’m really sorry but I have to get back to my dorm before it gets dark! There’s a wild coyote on campus so I try not to walk alone at night!”

“Don’t tell Keeri that, she would probably try to befriend him. One time back in middle school, she kept a pet raccoon in her backyard without telling her parents.  Let’s just say they weren’t happy when there was a bad storm and she let him in the house. Do you need any help getting back to campus?”

“No, I’ll just take the bus back. Do you think you might want to come to a party with me on Friday, though? I promise I have some friends who aren’t assholes too.”

“I’m not sure I believe it, so I guess I have to go now.”

Jemilla promised to text her the details before leaving toward the nearest bus stop. Zazzalil had mentioned an ex-girlfriend in conversation, so Jemilla actually had a chance with her. The small girl completely drew her in and made her forget about everything else after she had told her ridiculous story after ridiculous story. While some of the more dangerous ones made her Mom Friend senses tingle, the idea of a young Zazzalil climbing trees just to chase squirrels was just too adorable to picture.

Zazzalil was definitely very laid back and maybe a little lazy, something that would normally annoy her, but it was clear that she must have worked really hard in order for a professor to convince her large university to personally give her a scholarship. Even the level of trust her boss had in her spoke loudly. Jemilla didn't want to get ahead of herself, but perhaps Zazzalil could provide a good balance to her own personality.

 She texted one of her best friends, Emberly, and asked the girl if she could help her with getting ready for the party later that week. Her friend always seemed to know what hair style, clothes, or makeup would suit anyone and she figured if she wanted to look her best on Friday, Emberly would be the one to make it happen.  


End file.
